30 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



Megaptera lalandi (Fischer). 



The vertebrae of the humpbacked whale {Megaptera lalandi) belonging to the 

 collection consisted of the atlas, axis, and third and fourth cervical vertebrae. They 

 were from an animal captured in the New Zealand seas, probably in Queen Charlotte 

 Sound. 



The atlas was a distinct bone, but the axis and third and fourth vertebrae were anky- 

 losed into one block. The bones had evidently been exposed on the beach for some time, 

 as they were rubbed and weathered, and had many small pebbles in their grooves and 

 foramina. The transverse diameter of the atlas was 26 inches, its supero-iuferior 14i 

 inches. The spine was stunted. The transverse processes were massive and undivided. 

 The groove for the sub-occipital nerve was converted into a foramen by a bridge of bone. 

 The occipital articular surface was divided into two facets by a mesial notch and furrow. 

 The axis had a transverse diameter of 32^ inches, a supero-inferior of 13^ inches. The 

 spine was massive, and both it and the right lamina were fused with the corresponding 

 parts of the third cervical. The transverse processes each possessed a superior and 

 inferior division continued into each other externally by a broad plate of bone, so that the 

 " vertebrarterial " foramen was completely bounded by bone. A broad stunted process, 

 representing a rudimentary odontoid projected from the anterior surface of the bone, and 

 was received into a corresponding hollow on the posterior surface of the atlas. The 

 superior transverse process of the third vertebra was a slender plate of bone 4 inches long ; 

 the inferior transverse process was much stronger, and 7 inches in length. The superior 

 transverse process of the fourth vertebra was 8-J inches long, but the inferior was only 5 

 inches, both were strong bars of bones. Neither in the third nor fourth vertebrge did the 

 superior and inferior transverse j)rocesses meet externally so as to complete the boundary 

 of a foramen. The body of the axis was 15m inches in its greatest transverse diameter 

 by 9 inches in its greatest supero-inferior. The body of the fourth cervical was 10 

 inches by 7f , and as it was not so rounded at the sides as in Balcenoptera, its shape 

 approached the quadrangular. The fusion between the bodies of the second, third, 

 and fourth vertebrae was not comj)lete, but restricted to the sides of their anterior 

 and posterior surfaces, so that intervertebral discs had obviously been present in 

 the recent state between the greater part of the surfaces of the bodies. The left laminae 

 of the third and fourth vertebrae were fused with each other, but not those of the right 

 side. 



The presence of a large Eorqual in the seas of the Southern Hemisphere was deter- 

 mined by Cuvier, from a skeleton brought to Paris by Delalande from the Cape of Good 

 Hope, and was named by him Rorqual du Cap. Fischer subsequently called it Balcsna 

 lalandii, but it was recognised by Schlegel that it possessed affinities to the long-finned 

 Eorqual of the Northern Hemisphere, Megaptera longimana. Dr J. E. Gray considered 



